It’s Christmas season already and everyone is out and about for the Christmas rush. When you are buying gifts in a crowded place like Divisoria, remember to be always wary of snatchers or thieves. A CCTV video of a new “Christmas modus operandi” is going viral to serve as a warning to shoppers.

Before, thieves would immediately run after stealing, this time they came up with a new “modus.”

The video shared by Ryan Yan on Facebook by Dianne Marie Maynite received numerous reactions from the netizens. The clip showed a shopper (in white) wearing a body bag busily picking out bags. You can notice that the shopper had tried to place his body bag right in front of her, as what authorities had reminded every shopper so they can easily see it. But, two woman (in black and white) pretending to be shoppers arrived. They tried to position themselves in between the shopper (in white) and alternately moving beside her until we can clearly see one of them opened the body bag.

It only takes a few seconds for the shopper to notice that her body bag is open and is now empty. She starts to panic and runs towards another person probably her husband. Before, we are used to seeing thieves run and hide immediately after snatching but the two woman remained on the spot and continued to look at bags. The shopper tried to face the two women but for some reason couldn’t confront them. After a few minutes, the thieves decided to leave.

The whole scene only took less than 2 minutes. Netizens shared their anger and frustration of the thieves’ new “modus.” The video had gone viral with 3.7 million views as of press time.

Again, this holiday season let’s all be extra careful and mindful of our things. Let’s continue to be on the lookout for new “modus” from thieves and report any suspicious activity to the authorities.

You can watch the video from Ryan Yan’s Facebook page here:

— Sally, The Summit Express

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